An infrastructure wireless local area network (WLAN) operating under the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 standards typically involves the use of an access point to manage network functions and coordinate communications between one or more associated stations. To obtain benefits associated with a WLAN without the need for a dedicated access point, techniques exist for creating a network between two or more peers in an ad hoc or peer-to-peer network topology. WLAN devices may discover each other and share data traffic directly, without the instance of a traditional access point. This type of network configuration may be known as an independent basic service set (IBSS). One example of a peer-to-peer network is a Wireless Fidelity (WiFi) Direct™ network. As IBSS networks typically do not have a distribution system or other dedicated device to control the network, one peer may undertake certain management functions by acting in the role of peer-to-peer group owner (P2P GO) and one or more additional devices may associate with the GO as P2P clients.
In order to form a peer-to-peer network, participating devices generally initiate a communications link through a device discovery process. A find phase involving a search state and a listen state may be configured to facilitate the ability of unassociated devices to discover each other's presence on a common wireless channel. During the listen state, a device parks on one of a defined subset of wireless channels and waits for a probe request frame to be sent by another device. During the search state, the device switches between channels in the defined subset and transmits probe request frames. Discovery may occur when one device in the listen state receives a probe request sent by the other device and returns a probe response frame. As a result, successful discovery may require one device to be in the listen state while the other device is in the search state. Conventionally, a device may be configured to rotate between the listen state and the search state for random periods of time to increase the probability that complementary periods of search and listen will overlap with other devices so that discovery may occur. However, even with this provision, there may be periods when both devices are in the same state, which delays discovery.
The proliferation of devices communicating using wireless local area networks (WLANs) has led to the development of devices that feature multiple, independent transceivers that allow simultaneous operations to occur over one or more frequency bands. Examples include dual band dual concurrent (DBDC) technologies that allow a device to operate under 802.11 standards simultaneously in the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands by using separate transceivers. As implied by the name, DBDC generally implies that both transceivers are capable of supporting both bands and are able to operate concurrently. Likewise, a single band dual concurrent device (SBDC) may employ two separate transceivers to allow simultaneous operation in either the 2.4 or 5 GHz band, depending upon the configuration chosen. Dual concurrent devices offer the capability to perform independent operations in parallel using the respective transceivers.
Accordingly, it would desirable to coordinate operation of multiple concurrent transceivers to facilitate wireless communications, such as by enhancing a device discovery process. This disclosure achieves these and other goals.